He's a quite brilliant manager and I would have been delighted to see him come here. But I don't think that was ever really likely, given the state of the squad, and rebuilding job - and cash - that is required at Liverpool.
While he has shown that he can take teams like Porto to the very top, he usually likes the playing field to be a bit more level, so he can pretend to be the underdog (vs Barca, vs United, vs Juve, vs Arsenal) and then win.
He never says or does anything without there being a - usually very obvious - reason, and yet it would appear that his GCSE level psychological tricks are clever enough to position him as some kind of footballing Hannibal Lecter.
Oh well, whatever works.
He was at it again last night, giving Pellegrini another bashing, something he revelled in when the two where in La Liga, pointing out how ordinary managers can come "close", but great ones find a way to win. This no doubt fuelled by Pellegrini's failure with Madrid, and subsequent regular thrashings when Mourinho took his job and Pellegrini went to Malaga.
Now he's doing the hilarious "plucky underdog" routine again, despite the fact he could leave £30m Oscar on the bench, and his best players were Hazard (£32m), Willian (£31m) and Matic (£25m).
But he won. As usual.
A truly great manager. And yes, I F***ing hate him.
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